Unity AI Programming Essentials
Unity is a powerful cross-platform game creation system that includes a game engine and integrated development environment (IDE). AI programming in Unity is a key task for any game developer as it gives you the ability to make computer characters think and behave like a living organism. This book focuses on the different AI tasks that are essential for game development using Unity. It includes topics such as defining "minds" for your characters with behavior trees. Furthermore, it covers more specialized AI tasks such as how to implement AI crowds and how to create driving AI for vehicles. We have a section dedicated to NavMesh, one of the most important aspects of pathfinding, that will show you how to customize the mesh generation to handle different use cases for different characters. This is a practical book as it uses several popular Unity plugins such as RAIN and React AI to accomplish different AI tasks. ...
Unity is a powerful cross-platform game creation system that includes a game engine and integrated development environment (IDE). AI programming in Unity is a key task for any game developer as it gives you the ability to make computer characters think and behave like a living organism. This book focuses on the different AI tasks that are essential for game development using Unity. It includes topics such as defining "minds" for your characters with behavior trees. Furthermore, it covers more specialized AI tasks such as how to implement AI crowds and how to create driving AI for vehicles. We have a section dedicated to NavMesh, one of the most important aspects of pathfinding, that will show you how to customize the mesh generation to handle different use cases for different characters. This is a practical book as it uses several popular Unity plugins such as RAIN and React AI to accomplish different AI tasks. ...
Unity Game Development Scripting
The intuitive and powerful Unity game engine is one of the most widely used and best loved packages for game development. Unity scripting is an essential but challenging skill to master in order to create custom game elements. Learning modular scripting allows you to rewrite as little code as possible as you deploy your scripts to multiple projects and work easier, quicker, and more efficiently than before. In each chapter of this book, you'll learn how to script new game elements. Beginning with making custom controls for the keyboard and mouse, as well as the Xbox 360 Controller, you'll then get to grips with more complex systems such as inventory, data saving, and artificial intelligence. As you create these elements, you'll also learn how to make your scripts simpler and easy to use. This will allow drag-and-drop deployment, which is to be used by designers and nonprogrammers. Finally, you'll combine all of your newfound skills to create your own complete game project. ...
The intuitive and powerful Unity game engine is one of the most widely used and best loved packages for game development. Unity scripting is an essential but challenging skill to master in order to create custom game elements. Learning modular scripting allows you to rewrite as little code as possible as you deploy your scripts to multiple projects and work easier, quicker, and more efficiently than before. In each chapter of this book, you'll learn how to script new game elements. Beginning with making custom controls for the keyboard and mouse, as well as the Xbox 360 Controller, you'll then get to grips with more complex systems such as inventory, data saving, and artificial intelligence. As you create these elements, you'll also learn how to make your scripts simpler and easy to use. This will allow drag-and-drop deployment, which is to be used by designers and nonprogrammers. Finally, you'll combine all of your newfound skills to create your own complete game project. ...
The Art of Application Performance Testing, 2nd Edition
Because performance is paramount today, this thoroughly updated guide shows you how to test mission-critical applications for scalability and performance before you deploy them-whether it's to the cloud or a mobile device. You'll learn the complete testing process lifecycle step-by-step, along with best practices to plan, coordinate, and conduct performance tests on your applications. Written by a consultant with over 15 years' experience with performance testing, The Art of Application Performance Testing thoroughly explains the pitfalls of an inadequate testing strategy and offers a robust, structured approach for ensuring that your applications perform well and scale effectively when the need arises. ...
Because performance is paramount today, this thoroughly updated guide shows you how to test mission-critical applications for scalability and performance before you deploy them-whether it's to the cloud or a mobile device. You'll learn the complete testing process lifecycle step-by-step, along with best practices to plan, coordinate, and conduct performance tests on your applications. Written by a consultant with over 15 years' experience with performance testing, The Art of Application Performance Testing thoroughly explains the pitfalls of an inadequate testing strategy and offers a robust, structured approach for ensuring that your applications perform well and scale effectively when the need arises. ...
You Don't Know JS: Types & Grammar
No matter how much experience you have with JavaScript, odds are you don't fully understand the language. As part of the "You Don't Know JS" series, this compact guide explores JavaScript types in greater depth than previous treatments by looking at type coercion problems, demonstrating why types work, and showing you how to take advantage of these features. Like other books in this series, You Don't Know JS: Types & Grammar dives into trickier parts of the language that many JavaScript programmers simply avoid or assume don't exist (like types). Armed with this knowledge, you can achieve true JavaScript mastery. ...
No matter how much experience you have with JavaScript, odds are you don't fully understand the language. As part of the "You Don't Know JS" series, this compact guide explores JavaScript types in greater depth than previous treatments by looking at type coercion problems, demonstrating why types work, and showing you how to take advantage of these features. Like other books in this series, You Don't Know JS: Types & Grammar dives into trickier parts of the language that many JavaScript programmers simply avoid or assume don't exist (like types). Armed with this knowledge, you can achieve true JavaScript mastery. ...
Introducing GitHub
If you're new to GitHub, this concise book shows you just what you need to get started and no more. It's perfect for project and product managers, stakeholders, and other team members who want to collaborate on a development project—whether it's to review and comment on work in progress or to contribute specific changes. It's also great for developers just learning GitHub. GitHub has rapidly become the default platform for software development, but it's also ideal for other text-based documents, from contracts to screenplays. This hands-on book shows you how to use GitHub's web interface to view projects and collaborate effectively with your team. ...
If you're new to GitHub, this concise book shows you just what you need to get started and no more. It's perfect for project and product managers, stakeholders, and other team members who want to collaborate on a development project—whether it's to review and comment on work in progress or to contribute specific changes. It's also great for developers just learning GitHub. GitHub has rapidly become the default platform for software development, but it's also ideal for other text-based documents, from contracts to screenplays. This hands-on book shows you how to use GitHub's web interface to view projects and collaborate effectively with your team. ...
Swift Development with Cocoa
Ready to build apps for iPhone, iPad, and Mac now that Swift has landed? If you're an experienced programmer who's never touched Apple developer tools, this hands-on book shows you how to use the Swift language to make incredible iOS and OS X apps, using Cocoa and Cocoa Touch. Learn how to use Swift in a wide range of real-world situations, with Cocoa features such as Event Kit and Core Animation. You'll pick up Swift language features and syntax along the way, and understand why using Swift (instead of Objective-C) makes iOS and Mac app development easier, faster, and safer. You'll also work with several exercises to help you practice as you learn. ...
Ready to build apps for iPhone, iPad, and Mac now that Swift has landed? If you're an experienced programmer who's never touched Apple developer tools, this hands-on book shows you how to use the Swift language to make incredible iOS and OS X apps, using Cocoa and Cocoa Touch. Learn how to use Swift in a wide range of real-world situations, with Cocoa features such as Event Kit and Core Animation. You'll pick up Swift language features and syntax along the way, and understand why using Swift (instead of Objective-C) makes iOS and Mac app development easier, faster, and safer. You'll also work with several exercises to help you practice as you learn. ...
Modern PHP
PHP is experiencing a renaissance, though it may be difficult to tell with all of the outdated PHP tutorials online. With this practical guide, you'll learn how PHP has become a full-featured, mature language with object-orientation, namespaces, and a growing collection of reusable component libraries. Author Josh Lockhart - creator of PHP The Right Way, a popular initiative to encourage PHP best practices—reveals these new language features in action. You'll learn best practices for application architecture and planning, databases, security, testing, debugging, and deployment. If you have a basic understanding of PHP and want to bolster your skills, this is your book. ...
PHP is experiencing a renaissance, though it may be difficult to tell with all of the outdated PHP tutorials online. With this practical guide, you'll learn how PHP has become a full-featured, mature language with object-orientation, namespaces, and a growing collection of reusable component libraries. Author Josh Lockhart - creator of PHP The Right Way, a popular initiative to encourage PHP best practices—reveals these new language features in action. You'll learn best practices for application architecture and planning, databases, security, testing, debugging, and deployment. If you have a basic understanding of PHP and want to bolster your skills, this is your book. ...
Knockout.js
Use Knockout.js to design and build dynamic client-side web applications that are extremely responsive and easy to maintain. This example-driven book shows you how to use this lightweight JavaScript framework and its Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM) pattern. You'll learn how to build your own data bindings, extend the framework with reusable functions, and work with a server to enhance your client-side application with persistence. In the final chapter, you'll build a shopping cart to see how everything fits together. If you're a web developer with experience in JavaScript, HTML, and CSS, you're ready for Knockout. ...
Use Knockout.js to design and build dynamic client-side web applications that are extremely responsive and easy to maintain. This example-driven book shows you how to use this lightweight JavaScript framework and its Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM) pattern. You'll learn how to build your own data bindings, extend the framework with reusable functions, and work with a server to enhance your client-side application with persistence. In the final chapter, you'll build a shopping cart to see how everything fits together. If you're a web developer with experience in JavaScript, HTML, and CSS, you're ready for Knockout. ...
eXist
Get a head start with eXist, the open source NoSQL database and application development platform built entirely around XML technologies. With this hands-on guide, you'll learn eXist from the ground up, from using this feature-rich database to work with millions of documents to building complex web applications that take advantage of eXist's many extensions. If you're familiar with XML - as a student, professor, publisher, or developer - you'll find that eXist is ideal for all kinds of documents. This book shows you how to store, query, and search documents with XQuery and other XML technologies, and how to construct applications on top of the database with tools such as eXide and eXist's built-in development environment. ...
Get a head start with eXist, the open source NoSQL database and application development platform built entirely around XML technologies. With this hands-on guide, you'll learn eXist from the ground up, from using this feature-rich database to work with millions of documents to building complex web applications that take advantage of eXist's many extensions. If you're familiar with XML - as a student, professor, publisher, or developer - you'll find that eXist is ideal for all kinds of documents. This book shows you how to store, query, and search documents with XQuery and other XML technologies, and how to construct applications on top of the database with tools such as eXide and eXist's built-in development environment. ...
tmux
It's pretty common for a modern developer to have a database console, web server, and a text editor running at the same time. Switching between these with the mouse takes up valuable time and can break your concentration. By using tmux, you can improve your productivity and regain your focus. This book will show you how. You'll learn how to manage multiple terminal sessions within tmux using only your keyboard. You'll see how to manage and run programs side-by-side in panes, and you'll learn how to create the perfect development environment with custom scripts so that when you're ready to work, your programs are waiting for you. ...
It's pretty common for a modern developer to have a database console, web server, and a text editor running at the same time. Switching between these with the mouse takes up valuable time and can break your concentration. By using tmux, you can improve your productivity and regain your focus. This book will show you how. You'll learn how to manage multiple terminal sessions within tmux using only your keyboard. You'll see how to manage and run programs side-by-side in panes, and you'll learn how to create the perfect development environment with custom scripts so that when you're ready to work, your programs are waiting for you. ...